Some Options Students Moving to Satellite

Options Public Charter School at the corner of 14th & E, NE.

Options Public Charter School, the city’s oldest charter school, serves at-risk students from its campus at 14th & E Streets, NE.  Currently 70% of Options students have some sort of special need, according to the school’s Executive Director, Dr. Donna Montgomery.  At the start of this school year, 30 students with the diagnosis of conduct disorder were placed at Options.  Dr. Montgomery came to the ANC 6A meeting to share with the commission their plan for dealing with these students, following complaints from the community.

School officials chose the Options campus for these children but, as Dr. Montgomery reported, it turned out that they need more intensive services than the school can provide.  Issues with their behavior have not only put a strain on school resources, but have also been evident in the neighborhood as the students wandered to and from the campus.  Dr. Montgomery said additional staff have been engaged to be present in the neighborhood during afternoon dismissal in order to monitor these children, watching over them for several blocks.  The school also ended up contracting three buses to serve these particularly difficult children, picking them up and dropping them off before and after school.  Though the $19,000 expense incurred over a three week period is not sustainable, Montgomery said.

Working with MPD and the school board, a new developmental plan has been crafted to serve these students that includes a smaller setting and a more therapeutic environment.  That environment will not be in this neighborhood, though.  An Options satellite campus is opening on 11th Street in Northwest.  Beginning in January, the students with conduct disorder will go to that campus, with specially trained instructors, along with drug and family therapy.